$10,000 Each For Five Eco-Friendly Projects

There are people among us who study environmental issues and make a personal commitment to live lightly on the planet -- then go a step further by helping their community get greener as well. They set up recycling programs, weatherize homes, clean up watersheds, plant trees. You know these folks. You've seen them. Maybe you're one of them!

They are the very people who should know about the Green Heroes Grant Program sponsored by the makers of Green Works(tm) Natural Cleaners. The brand is giving away $10,000 grants to five "heroes," people who have organized eco-friendly projects whether they're at the neighborhood level or community-wide. You can nominate yourself, or you can nominate someone you know whose work has impressed you -- just visit the website, fill in a short form, upload a photo, and explain why the person and project are worthy of the grant. (please note, only individual members are eligible for non-Sierra Club projects and programs. Sierra Club chapters and programs are not eligible)The submission deadline is February 28th. After that, a panel of judges -- the Sierra Club, along with the folks at EcoFabulous and Josh Dorfman, aka The Lazy Environmentalist -- will choose the finalists, and the public will vote on them from March 16 through April 10. The five winners will be announced on Earth Day.

Surely you can think of a project or two that could use an injection of cash right now. Sign 'em up!

And for anyone who's wondering what the heck Green Works is, it's the relatively new line of eco-friendly cleaning products launched by Clorox a year ago, with some proceeds going to the Sierra Club. What's interesting, as TreeHugger blogger John Laumer pointed out in a post in November, is that the product line has been quite successful, showing 100% growth in a year's time, and snagging a 42% share of the market. What's even more interesting is that this has happened without eroding cleaning product sales for smaller green-product companies like Method and Seventh Generation. Instead, the products seem to be luring customers away from traditional cleaning products.